Rickshaw from Kathmandu is a wind-powered WTF?

Pedalling a rickshaw is hard work, but tacking on a petrol motor only contributes to urban smog. We can only imagine that’s why a pedicab driver in Kathmandu, Nepal attached a windmill -- made from a metal drum -- to his rickshaw.

Our friend Shiro Hosojima over at the Japanese blog Eco-Ideas told us about the rad ride, which he described as a wind-human hybrid vehicle. We were intrigued. Apparently, the rickshaw driver wanted a cab that was easier to pedal so he commissioned a professor in a nearby town to design and build a windmill that would provide extra thrust.

One of Hosojima’s friends caught the vehicle on video, and it appears to work -- though we’d hate to be passengers on a rainy day as the windmill dumped water on our heads.

As the drum rotates, it assists in acceleration. The windmill is connected to the rear wheels with a side-mounted gear, which would make the pedicab easier to pedal in a tailwind -- a concept remarkably similar to the wind-powered DWFTTW vehicle US Wired wrote about yesterday.